Zulfiquar Rao

The noisy zealousness that we are witnessing about the need to construct the Diamir-Bhasha dam reflects very poorly of our national psyche. It’s amazing how suddenly, we have woken to this reality that water scarcity poses an existential threat to Pakistan. However, the situation did not turn dire recently. The fact is, Pakistan has been […]

Zulfikar Ali Bhutto was a lone star under Ayub Khan’s regime, who enjoyed exceptional influence among both the masses and the military establishment. Despite being from a landed aristocratic family from Sindh and studying in the west, Bhutto’s vision of Pakistan was laced with a complicated identity of Socialism and Islam. For instance, although back […]

Imran Khan’s ascendency as the 22nd Prime Minister (PM) of Pakistan is indeed a spectacular outcome for Khan’s 22 year old political struggle. He founded his party, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) in 1996, and stood for social justice and accountability on the model set by Hazrat Omar (RA), the second of the four Rightly Guided Caliphs […]

His inaugural speech as the Prime Minister (PM) last Sunday, Imran Khan addressed many issues. Most of what he said could not be disagreed with, at least on face value. Obviously, fixing the economy had to be one of the most important challenges for any new PM. Part of fixing the economy is related to […]

Last week some of the local TV channels flashed a ticker wherein the Chief Election Commissioner was attributed to have made some derogatory remarks about Speaker of the National Assembly Ayaz Sadiq, while hearing a case related to the violation of the election’s code of conduct. Thankfully, this was later refuted as fake news. However, […]

Just last month in Delhi, a family of eleven committed collective suicide. Initially, it looked as if there must be some wicked perpetrator behind this chilling mass suicide; however, not before it was too late, the police found out that the deaths were result of a shared psychological disorder that this unfortunate family lived with. […]

Although this was not the first time that Pakistanis saw sham elections where one party was favoured by the deep state, thanks to social media and coverage by international journalistic media, the people know quite well how the recent elections were rigged. It started with a pre-poll media blackout of PML-N leaders’ speeches and the […]

By this morning, Pakistanis should know what lies ahead. Irrespective of who forms the government and whether it will be a majority government or a coalition, the new government will have to face phenomenal challenges. It will be tasked with resuscitating Pakistani democracy and its economy, both of which lie in tatters thanks for most […]

In February 2012, then President Asif Ali Zardari signed the 20th amendment into the constitution, which provided for the installation of independent caretaker governments in the centre and provinces at the end of the term of national and provincial assemblies. The caretakers would mainly be responsible to hold the elections for new assemblies and run […]